Australia's Gold Coast averages 245 days of fine, sunny weather each year. Combine those awesome weather conditions with a picture perfect coastline, tropical forests and plenty of well maintained roads and you've pretty much created a motorcyclists wet dream. One builder who's been servicing the custom needs of the Gold Coasts privileged riding community for the past 4 years is Justin Holmes who is the owner/operator of 'PopBang Classics'. Justin's a multidisciplinary builder with years of experience in spray painting, mechanics, engineering and fabrication and he builds everything from classic Brit based choppers to retro Japanese cafe racers. One of his latest creations is this tidy little '81 Suzuki GSX250 and I've got the scoop from the man himself about how it all came together...

The owner of the Suzuki came to Justin after purchasing the $300 basket case. As an unfinished, neglected project the bike was missing plenty of parts and to Justin's disgust what was left on the bike was plenty of matt black rattle can paint. Over 12 months Justin shared his time between the Suzuki and other builds in the shop working to the owners request of a specific paint scheme and some Cafe Racer styling. The only other instruction Justin was given was to "go for it" so using his sizeable skill set that's exactly what he did.

"I definitely wanted to make the bike as minimal as possible while having a lot of stand out details. Simple, sleek and classy was how I pictured it from the beginning.

First I got the bike completely stripped down to a bare frame. A new tail hoop was then added and the frame was smoothed and all unnecessary tabs and holes were removed. The wheels were disassembled and a large Yamaha drum brake was used to replaced the not so great single disc setup. That change necessitated the left fork leg having the calliper mounts shaved off and a stop for the drum welded in place. The triple clamps were smoothed and the top clamp had the handle bar mounts cut down and holes welded up. The frame, swing arm, rims, hubs, fork legs, trees and brackets were all then sand blasted and high fill primed before being painted 2 pack gloss black."

"The rims and hubs were then laced up with stainless spokes and fitted with Firestone Champion Deluxe rubber. I then had the motor glass bead blasted to remove all the corrosion and the dodgy paint. During this stage I noticed some crazy sealer baked onto the engine around the base gasket where someone had tried to patch up an oil leak. It looked like liquid nails and is exactly the sort of thing you tend to find on neglected projects like these."

"The engines top end was rebuilt next. Internally the motor was in pretty good condition and just needed a hone and some new rings, but I reseated the valves while I was in there to be safe. Once it was back together the motor was painted with a black basecoat and a satin clear with a Cream PopBang logo used to finish it, I then sanded the edges of the fins bare and polished them one at a time."

"The points cover was machined out and the interior light lens from and old HQ Holden was grafted into it and painted candy red, giving it a kind of art deco look. LED lights inside the cover work with the oil pressure switch and glow nicely when the bikes running."

"The exhaust pipes were custom made and were covered in a heat proof powder coat prior to being wrapped. I then turned up the tips on the lathe adding a 3 ring pattern for looks. All the foot controls/pegs and linkages were custom made from scratch and all the polished alloy features were hand machined and they all carry the same 3 line theme to tie everything together. The Velocity Stacks took about 3 hours each, being machined from solid round bar! The handlebars were also custom made with chromoly and they use old style Honda switches with an internal throttle assembly. The grips were also turned up out of alloy and wrapped with Brooks handlebar leather tape. I then proceeded to make a seat base out of fibreglass and had it trimmed in chocolate brown to match the Brooks leather grips."

"All the electrics are hidden under the seat in a moulded fibreglass electrical box and all the wiring is hidden through the frame. I stashed the battery and solenoid in a custom box out of sight behind the engine under the bikes swing arm. The tail lights and indicators are LED inserts that I placed into custom made housings with smoked lenses and the tank was repaired and raised at the rear to follow a better line. I then painted cream it and polished it to a glass finish."

Along with all of those modifications Justin also added a Hella Black Magic spotlight modified to function as a normal headlight with low and high beams. He added a mini speedo, fork tube indicators, Progressive rear shocks and some custom made fibreglass fenders. Billet mirrors hang from the handlebar ends and all the rusty old fasteners were swapped out for stainless ones.

What's beautiful about this bike is it's lack of clutter and the incredible amount of detail he's integrated without sacrificing simplicity. With builds like this you can be sure you'll be seeing more of Justin's work here in the future. In the meantime be sure to follow PopBand Classics on Instagram for a look at what he gets up to in the workshop from day to day.

BROWSE BY MOTORCYCLE BRAND

ABOUT ROCR

Since 2006 I've been covering the global Cafe Racer and custom motorcycle scene. What started as a personal project and custom motorcycle build has today become one of the world's top motorcycle blogs reaching a massive global audience.

I'm a motorcycle rider, builder and journalist living in Melbourne, Australia. I aim to inspire people to start their own builds or to simply feed their passion for everything two wheels.

When it comes to featured builds I stick to my cafe racer theme featuring motorcycles that honour the cafe racer design or modification ethos. I also post regularly about the latest riding gear, events, new motorcycle releases and the occasional movie. If you've got something you'd like to share you can reach me here.